recalling my post last month on the Forced Migration Review's (FMR) edition on Palestinian refugees, I thought it would be useful to inform you that the Arabic edition of the journal is now ready. You can find it here.
Please do give a visit to FMR's Arabic website http://www.hijra.org.uk.
This is a must-see documentary
In 1923 Vladimir Jabotinsky, leading intellectual of the Zionist movement and father of the right wing of that movement, wrote: "Zionist colonization must either stop, or else proceed regardless of the native population. Which means that it can proceed and develop only under the protection of a power that is independent of the native population - behind an The Iron Wall , which the native population cannot breach." First published in Russian under the title O Zheleznoi Stene in Rassvyet, 4 November 1923.
From that day these words became the official and unspoken policy of the Zionist movement and later the state of Israel. Settlements were used from the beginning to create a Zionist foothold in Palestine.
The Iron Wall documentary exposes this phenomenon and follows the timeline, size, population of the settlements, and its impact on the peace process. This film also touches on the latest project to make the settlements a permanent fact on the ground; the wall that Israel is building in the West Bank and its impact on the Palestinian people.
Let the world know the truth, Spread the word...
Prepared by: Mira Nabulsi
Palestine Media Unit (Zajel - Al-Najah University, Palestine)
7th May, 2006
The story of Northern Asira does not differ much from other besieged Palestinian villages. Eight kilometers north of Nablus, the village used to be a vital passage to other nearby northern villages, with a main road that was totally closed by the Israeli occupation forces at the beginning of Al-Aqsa Intifada five years ago.
A few years ago, the Asira road was a busy road full of citizens coming from northern towns and villages to the city of Nablus for medical care and shopping for essentials. Citizens of these areas now have to travel to Nablus using rough roads which are normally long, tiring and muddy, especially during the rainy season. Being old, sick or an infant is not a good enough excuse for Israeli soldiers who, for years, have continued to harden conditions on citizens, especially university students who are the most frequent users.
Recently, the Al Bathan road was opened for northern and north-western inhabitants as a substitute for the two main roads of Asira and Shave Shamron colony. Still things didn't ease - while previous roads took only seven minutes to Nablus, this one is taking 40 minutes on an ideal day – which of course never happens. Previous transportation costs are now more than double and, coupled with other growing expenses, families of students are finding it difficult to cope.
In response to these excessive Israeli procedures, with the participation of some international activists, residents of Asira demonstrated peacefully several times. Israeli soldiers reacted with hostility and threatened to shoot live bullets. Residents are starting to lose hope for any possible change in spite of the fact that, in an effort to solve the problem, they have also submitted petitions. Until now all their efforts have been ineffective, and daily travel to and from their village is dependant upon Israeli soldiers' moods more than anything else.
There have been reports from some residents of Asira, who happen to be students of An-Najah National University, that on their way to the campus they have experienced and witnessed violations which are affecting their basic human rights, and in particular their rights to an education. From this we have chosen the story of Amjad Yasin.
Amjad's story …. A memory he'll never forget:
The worst story, and one which I could never forget, was what happened to me one day during the holy month of Ramadan, a month when Muslims are required to fast. I was walking with some other inhabitants of my village when suddenly some Israeli soldiers started to chase us, shouting: “Stop… or we'll shoot”, and so we stopped. We were ordered to sit on the ground. They took our I.D’s and started checking them. I was the youngest among the group. After three hours, soldiers gave the other two people with me their I.D’s, while I was kept on the ground, tied and blindfolded. Several hours passed and I couldn’t move. My eyes started to cause a lot of pain as they were tied strongly, so I thought it would be good if I could stand up to move my body which had started to suffer from cramp from being in the same uncomfortable position for hours. But I could barely do this as soldiers started beating me, especially on my head. They threw me back to the ground and I felt the soldiers’ bodies pressing on my back. They continued torturing me for a long time and later one of the soldiers stood up close to my head and started shouting: “If you want us to leave you; say ‘Long Live Israel’”. I consistently tried to refuse but it was becoming unbearable.
It was getting dark, and sunset Athan, (call to prayer) was announced, when people ended their fast with an Iftar meal. I was still living what seemed to me an endless agony – the Israeli soldiers were still kicking and beating me until I had to concede: "Long Live Israel". I am sorry Palestine, but they forced me. This continued until late at night until, finally, an Israeli jeep arrived. They put me in it while I was still tied and after approximately half an hour they threw me somewhere else, in a place I couldn’t yet recognize. I managed to open my eyes and I was glad to see that I wasn’t very far from my village. I started walking, exhausted as I was, until I reached the first house in the village. By this time it was almost 2 a.m.
This is one of the harshest memories I have from the daily ongoing sufferance on my way to and from the university. I hope whoever reads this will understand the misery of my people and will relay its sadness to the rest of the world in the hope that one day we Palestinians will get some of our violated pride back.”
Story by: Khaled Jamal Burini – Engineering Faculty.
Amjad Wadee’ Yaseen – Economics Faculty.
Few months ago a Palestinian speaker was addressing the audience when he said "Palestinians are the best nation in the world". I found that to be very racist and arrogant that I was about to lose my temper and rage at him but thanks God I controlled myself. By time I myself am accepting that statement more and more. Palestinians can't be normal human beings, otherwise they should have committed a collective suicide long time ago because any comparison between death and the current living conditions of the Palestinians will definitely tilt in favour of the former. So yes Palestinians are super heroes, but we need not to forget that even Superman himself died at the end when an alien called Doomsday came down to Earth and killed him. Palestinians are no stronger than Superman but Doomsday is an insignificant element when compared to the savage Zionist beast the Palestinians have been suffering because of for more than 58 years. The hourglass sand is already running out!
Watch and spread the word
Source: palestine-info.co.uk
Oct 10, 2006, 09:18
Occupied Jerusalem - Kamal Al-Khatib, the deputy leader of the Islamic Movement in the 1948 areas (Israel), has warned that desecrating the holy Aqsa Mosque in occupied Jerusalem would lead to a "big fire" in the region.
Khatib affirmed that any such desecration would lead to violent reactions that would be greater than the previous Aqsa intifada.
Commenting on the fanatic Israeli MP Uri Ariel's forced entry into the holy shrine on Monday, Khatib charged that the storming in the given circumstances pointed to approval of the official Israeli security apparatuses.
Ariel, of the extremist Mifdal party, toured the plazas in the holy site on Monday exploiting the Israeli intensified security presence to protect Jewish celebration of the Sukkot holiday, which blocked entry of Muslim worshippers to the Aqsa Mosque.
Ariel told Hebrew daily 'Ma'ariv' that his "visit" was meant to remind the world that the (Jewish) temple, which the Jews say should be built on the ruins of the holy Mosque on "the temple mount", represented the "Jewish people's throbbing heart".
"It is about time that all Jews should offer their prayers here (Aqsa Mosque)," he added.
Silence is all what I hear; no condemnation, no denouncement, nothing but absolute silence! If a normal Muslim (not an MP) openly declared he/she wants to take over and seize the Vatican or the Church of the Ascension in Jerusalem (which would never happen) all Muslims of the world would be bombarded with racist insults and accusations of terrorism and barbarism. But when it comes to a Zionist Jewish "Israeli" MP such as the bughouse terrorist above threatening to destroy the third holiest site for Muslims no one should be bothered, they are MUSLIMS!
Forward the news article to your national and local interfaith organisations or forums urging them to publicly condemn and denounce the Israeli threats to one of the holiest sites for 1.5 billion followers of the Islamic faith (of all origins and races).
Please give it few minutes of your time
Together we can make the difference
After the fall of Saddam Hussein in Iraq the targeted killing of Palestinians covertly still goes on, carried on by previously unseen death squads. People are killed just because they are Palestinians.
The Italian TV channel Rainews 24 report "The displaced people take flight", by Flaviano Masella edited by Maurizio Torrealta reveals the unbearable situation of hundreds of people with many interviews. They are trying to run away from a massacre that looks like last century's ethnic cleansings.
The interviews were made in Jordan in Ruwayshed refugee camp, which is located in a desert along the way that connects Amman and Baghdad.
The camp is run by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and hosts hundreds of Palestinians. They live in tents: in summer temperature can reach 50 degrees and in winter 0 degrees.
Women, men, children and old people got stuck in this camp waiting endlessly to go back to their normal life (if there was any!)
English Version
Arabic Version
If all leaders of the world were brave enough to speak the truth this planet would definitely be a more peaceful place to live on.
Ken's suspension order thrown out
The Mayor of Londno Ken Livingstone's four-week suspension from the mayor's office has been quashed by a High Court judge.
He was suspended for his remarks to a Jewish journalist likening him to a Nazi concentration camp guard.
The exchange with Oliver Finegold happened as the mayor left an event in February last year.
The mayor was challenging a decision by the Adjudication Panel for England that his comments breached the Greater London Authority's code of conduct.
The Board of Deputies of British Jews has demanded an apology from the mayor, regardless of the outcome of the case.
"What he doesn't seem to accept is a number of constituents for whom heis actually mayor - that is Holocaust survivors and the Jewish community - were offended by what he said and that apology he seems tohave problems in giving," Jon Benjamin, the chief executive of the organisation, said.
At the High Court, Mr Justice Collins said the suspension would be overturned, regardless of whether or not the mayor won his appeal against the Adjudication Panel for England's finding.
The judge said: "I have made it clear the suspension will be quashed whatever I decide on whether the Panel's finding wascorrect."
He reserved his final judgment on Mr Livingstone's appeal to a later date, saying: "It is not an easy case. There are certain ramifications, whatever I decide, which will affect other matters."
Flawed decision
The public were "heartily sick of the whole saga", Mr Benjamin said.
"I think we probably know what the chances of the mayor apologising now are, so we're not holding our breath," he said.
During the two-day hearing, Mr Livingstone's lawyers argued the panel's decision, made in February, was legally flawed on a number of grounds.
This included the fact the Mayor had not been acting in his official capacity at the time of the incident.
The panel's ruling was defended by the Ethical Standards Officer, who referred the case to the disciplinary body.
The ESO contended the Mayor's arguments were over-complicated and "trivialised" the code of conduct and there was no basis for the judge substituting his own judgment for that of the panel.
John Biggs, Labour's London Assembly member for Cityand London, welcomed the judge's decision to quash the order saying: "It should be for Londoners to decide if the Mayor should be removed from office and not an unelected quango. I am pleased that the judge agrees with us."
If the appeal fails, Mr Livingstone will be responsible for paying his own legal costs, estimated at £80,000, although he will continue to be paid.
Last January the Palestinian Solidarity Group (PSG) in my university published this 2006 wall calendar with valuable information on the Palestinian Diaspora. I know it's quite late to be used as a calendar but I still thought I'll post it here so that people can make use of the information it contains. (Click on the image below to download a reading-quality PDF file of the calendar -- Be patient as the file size is 1.5 MB).
If we are to produce a similar calendar for 2007, what topic you think would be the best as a theme for that calendar? (e.g. the wall, education ... etc).
I always wanted to tell you the story of our brothers in struggle but I never had enough time to do so; I hope today I do. Somewhere in the middle of the Indian ocean lie seven paradisiacal atolls and more than sixty fascinating islands. They all form the Chagos Archipelago. This place is like no other place on earth and its story is so unique for it inherits a lot from the mother of all odysseys of struggle for freedom and justice, Palestine.
To start with, I'll leave you for few minutes with an extract of John Pilger's "Out of Eden"
In long-forgotten archives in London and Mauritius is rare film of a community of contented people. The grainy, flickering images, full of movement of children playing on sandy beaches, and proud young women presenting their newborn for christening, and men setting out to fish, their dogs swimming alongside, are glimpses of a true paradise. There are thriving villages, a school, a hospital, a church, a light railway, set in a phenomenon of natural beauty: strings of coral atolls, floating in the turquoise of the Indian Ocean.
These were some of the 2,000 people who once lived on the Chagos archipelago, the majority on Diego Garcia, an atoll the shape of a tiny Italy, 14 miles long and six miles wide. Their ancestry went back to the 18th century, when the French brought slaves from Mozambique and Madagascar to work a coconut plantation. After Napoleon's defeat in 1815, the islands passed from French to British rule; about 20 years later, slavery was abolished.
Chagossian society continued to grow with the arrival of indentured labourers from India in the mid-19th century. By the 20th century they had developed a distinct language that was a lilting variation of French Creole. There were now three copra factories, supplying the coconut oil that lit street lamps in London, and a coaling station for ships en route to and from Australia; by the 1960s, there were plans for tourism. The workers received a small wage or payment in kind with commodities such as rice, oil and milk. They supplemented this by fishing in the abundantly stocked coastal waters, growing tomatoes, chilli, pumpkins and aubergines, and rearing chicken and ducks. As if celebrating a perfect vision of empire in such a place, a Colonial Office film from the 1950s describes the population as "born and brought up ... in conditions most tranquil and benign". The camera pans across a laughing woman hanging out clothes to dry in a coconut grove while her children play around her. This is Charlesia Alexis.
I met Charlesia recently, 50 years after she was filmed. She was sitting in the shade of her small, sparsely furnished house on the edge of Port Louis, the capital of Mauritius, more than 1,000 miles from her home. I asked her for her fondest memories of Diego Garcia. "Oh, everything!" she replied. "The sense of wellbeing is my fondest souvenir. My family could eat and drink what they liked; we never lacked for anything; we never bought anything, except clothes. Can you imagine that?"
"Why did you leave?"
"I left in 1967. My husband was very ill and I decided to take him to Port Louis to get the special treatment he needed. When we were ready to return, we went to Rogers & Company [they ran the boats] and asked for our tickets. They said they had instructions not to let us go back. They said Diego had been sold."
"Sold?"
"Yes, that's what they said. We were tricked. Looking back, the day before we left, the administrator told us to take a lot of fruit with us. They tricked us in so many ways, and when this game had run its course, they deported everyone, just like that. I was the fourth generation. Diego was my bird in the sky that was taken from me. I was sent to live in a slum, in rooms previously inhabited by goats and pigs. That's how they saw us."
Before you continue with Pilger's story, let's start the engines and fly "down" to Diego Garcia
I'll leave you again with the story until I bring the aircraft down to a lower altitude so that we can have a clearer look at the island.
What happened in the Chagos Islands was so searing, it may seem barely credible. Indeed La Lutte, as the Chagossians call their struggle for justice and freedom, arose from a crime that allows us to glimpse how great power works behind its respectable, democratic facade and how governments justify their actions with lies.
During the 1960s and 1970s, British governments, both Labour and Tory, tricked and expelled the entire population of the Chagos, a British colonial dependency, so that their homeland could be given to a foreign power, the United States, as the site for a military base. This "act of mass kidnapping", as one observer describes it, was carried out in high secrecy, along with the conspiracy that preceded it. For almost a decade, neither parliament nor the US Congress knew anything about it, and no journalist revealed it. BBC newsreaders still refer to US aircraft flying out to bomb Afghanistan and Iraq from the "uninhabited" island of Diego Garcia. Not only was the Chagossians' homeland stolen from them, but they were taken out of history. This scandal is unresolved today - even though the high court in London has twice ruled that the islanders' "wholesale removal" was an "abject legal failure".
The year was 1961. Two men strode up the jetty on Diego Garcia, filmed by missionaries unaware of the significance of their visitors. One was Rear Admiral Grantham of the US Navy, the leader of an American advance survey team whose objective was to find an island suitable for a military base that would allow Washington to dominate the Indian Ocean and beyond. For the next three years, British and American planners and engineers inspected the Chagos group. Finally, they selected the nearby island of Aldabra.
Their secret decision leaked out to the scientists of the Royal Society in London, who were horrified. Together with the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, this formidable establishment body mounted a campaign that saw off the Ministry of Defence and Admiral Grantham. The island's precious wildlife, including the giant land tortoise and the last flightless bird, were safe. The second choice, however, was not. This was Diego Garcia which, although rich in terrestrial and marine life, was not unique enough to excite the collective indignation of naturalists.
As for the presence of a flourishing human population, this was "not an insurmountable problem", advised the Foreign Office, for people could be "removed" and "the outside world [presented] with a scenario in which there were no permanent inhabitants on the archipelago".
In February 1964, a secret Anglo-American conference was held in London, at which the final decision was taken. Again, parliament was not informed. The following April, Anthony Greenwood, the colonial secretary in Harold Wilson's Labour government, flew to Mauritius, then a British colony that included the Chagos Islands. Greenwood spelled out the terms for granting independence to Mauritius. Despite United Nations Resolution 1514, which held that all colonial peoples had an inalienable right to independence without conditions, Greenwood offered it with strings. Mauritius could be free as long as Britain could keep the Chagos archipelago. The bribe was a mere £3m, together with a promise to support Mauritian sugar preferences.
Thus Charlesia's homeland was "sold". On November 8 1965, in the twilight of its colonial era, Britain created a new colony, the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT), whose principal territory was the Chagos Islands. It was a ruse of which perhaps only Britain's ancien régime was capable; for the new colony was a fake, an entity created for the sole purpose of handing it over for the use of the American military. This was made possible by using the archaic powers of the royal prerogative, a throwback to the divine right of kings.
Although barely reported in the press, word of this manoeuvre reached the United Nations in New York, spurring the General Assembly to pass Resolution 2066, which called on the British government "to take no action which would dismember the territory of Mauritius and violate its territorial integrity". This was ignored.
In December 1966, Lord Chalfont, a Foreign Office minister, signed a contract in Washington giving the Pentagon a 50-year "lease" on Diego Garcia with an automatic extension of 20 years. Declassified state department documents obtained under the US Freedom of Information Act in 2005 reveal that Washington wanted the entire population expelled; as one official put it, the islands were to be "swept" and "sanitised". This was described in a secret file as "a neat, sensible package".
In 1974,a joint UK-US question-and-answer "official truth" primer for embassies around the world asked: "Is there a native population on the Chagos Islands?" The reply was "No." A Ministry of Defence spokesman denied this was a lie, in the process uttering perhaps the most amazing lie of all. "There is nothing in our files," he said, "about inhabitants or about an evacuation." It was not until 1975 that the US Senate revealed that the British government had been secretly "compensated" for the Chagos with a discount of $14m off the price of a Polaris nuclear submarine. This itself was illegal, as it was never submitted to Congress for approval; and the document Chalfont signed stated falsely that the US would pay no rent for acquiring "base rights". There was no mention of a population.
You can take a break now and enjoy watching the paradise from the sky
John Pilger still has more to tell us ...
Lizette Talate is also in the Colonial Office film. She was 14 years old at the time and remembers the producer saying to her and her friends, "Keep smiling, girls!" Sitting in her kitchen in Port Louis, she says, "We didn't need to be told. I was a happy child, because my roots were deep in Diego. My great-grandmother was born on Diego, and my grandmother was born there, and my mother was born there, and I was born there. I made six children there. Maybe only the English can make a film that showed we were an established community, then deny their own evidence and invent the lie that we were transient workers. That's why they couldn't legally throw us out of our own homes; they had to terrify us into leaving or force us out."
"How did they terrify you?" I asked.
"They tried to starve us. The food ships stopped arriving, and everything was scarce. There was no milk, no dairy products, no oil, no sugar, no salt. When they couldn't starve us out of our homes, they spread rumours that we would be bombed, then they turned on our dogs."
The Chagossians love their dogs; they are inseparable. The plan to kill all the dogs on the island - with its unsubtle implication that humans might be next - came from Sir Bruce Greatbatch, then Her Majesty's Governor of the Seychelles. "At first they tried poisoned fish balls," said Lizette. "That killed a few and left many in terrible agony. Then they paid a man to walk round with a big stick beating them to death, or trying to. Finally, American soldiers, who had already begun to arrive, gassed them, and the bodies - many still alive - were thrown on to a shelf that usually held the flesh of coconuts as it was cooked ... children listened to the howls of their pets being burned to death."
Along with 180 others, Lizette and her family were forced on to the vessel Nordvaer, which had plied between the Chagos and Mauritius and the Seychelles, transporting copra and taking supplies back to the islands. The men were herded on to the bridge and had to stand or crouch in very rough weather; the women and children were made to sleep in the hold on a cargo of fertiliser - bird shit. People vomited and suffered diarrhoea; two women miscarried.
"Even water was scarce," says Lizette. "What I can't forget is the fear and uncertainty for myself and my family. When we got to the Seychelles, the police were waiting for us. They marched us up the hill to a prison, where we were kept in cells until the boat was ready to take us on to Mauritius.
"I suppose we took some hope in the promise that in Mauritius we would be granted a house, a piece of land, animals and a sum of money. We got nothing."
The former president of Mauritius, Cassam Uteem, who has championed the Chagossians' rights, told me: "You can't imagine how bewildered and terrified they were ... These were a people who would sing their way through life; and here they were, weeping their way through life, and they are still weeping.
"I know of one lady who lost two children within two or three months, and she wasn't able even to perform their funerals because she didn't have any money. The children were taken from the hospital straight to the cemetery. That lady is still weeping."
Lizette is that lady. She lost Jollice, aged eight, and Regis, aged 10 months. Her husband died soon afterwards. "They died of sadness," she tells me. "It is true, because the doctor said he could not treat sadness. Lizette is a wiry, formidably intelligent woman who wears a mask of grief and determination. "I am going home," she says. "I am not to be pitied; I am fighting."
Ok, now let's see; The shameless British government, which was brought to power by the British themselves, granted Palestine, a land that belonged to no one but the Palestinians, to the Zionist Jews to build the Zionist, racist, apartheid, illegal, cancer state of "Israel". Another selfish British government, again brought forward by the British people, offered Diego Garcia paradise to the Americans for a $14m discount, disregarding the lives of hundreds of thousands of the true owners of that paradise. So what did the Americans do with that atoll?
But the story hasn't finished yet ...
By 1975, the Chagossians in exile began to die from their imposed poverty. Most were unemployed and penniless and either sharing a slum or sleeping rough. In a letter to an MP, a Foreign Office official wrote: "Although we have no information about deaths, some deaths are bound to have occurred in the normal course of events."
That was a lie. The Foreign Office had sent a senior official, ARG Prosser, to investigate; he had sent back a graphically detailed report on the islanders' living conditions and advised that "something needs to be done".
The government's response was to offer a minuscule £650,000 in compensation to the entire population. Even this did not arrive until 1978, five years after the last islander had been deported.
In 1981, several hundred Chagossian women converged on the British High Commission in Port Louis, sat down and sang, and demanded proper compensation. Thanks to their protest, it appeared that progress was being made on compensation. On March 27 1982, a group of the most impoverished islanders accepted a "full and final" settlement of £4m - less than half the estimated minimum that they could survive on. But on what the islanders wanted most - the right to return - there was a deafening silence.
In the 1990s, the islanders' struggle took a dramatic turn when a treasure trove of declassified official documents was discovered in the National Archives at Kew, in London. This provided the narrative of a conspiracy between two governments to carry out, in the words of Article 7 of the statute of the international criminal court, the "deportation or forcible transfer of a population ... a crime against humanity".
On July 28 1965, a senior Foreign Office official, TCD Jerrom, wrote to the British representative at the United Nations, FDW Brown, instructing him to lie to the general assembly that the Chagos Islands were "uninhabited when the United Kingdom government first acquired them". This Brown did on November 16 1965. He also misrepresented the population as "labourers from Mauritius and the Seychelles" for whom Britain's obligations under the United Nations Charter "did not apply", and he lied that the "new administrative arrangements" had been "freely worked out with the ... elected representatives of the people concerned".
In a secret memorandum, a Colonial Office official, KWS MacKenzie, spelt out the truth. "One of the things we would like to do in the new Territory," he wrote, "is to convert all the existing residents into short-term, temporary residents by giving them temporary immigration permits, describing them as inhabitants of Mauritius or the Seychelles."
Reading the files, it is clear that the British government did as it was told by Washington. Mass deportation, wrote a Foreign Office official, "was made virtually a condition of the agreement [with the Americans] when we negotiated it in 1965".
What these files also reveal is an imperious attitude of brutality and contempt. On August 24 1966, Sir Paul Gore-Booth, permanent under-secretary at the Foreign Office, wrote: "We must surely be very tough about this. The object of the exercise is to get some rocks which will remain ours. There will be no indigenous population except seagulls."
At the bottom of the page is a postscript handwritten by DA Greenhill, another senior official, who became Baron Greenhill of Harrow.
"Unfortunately," he wrote, "along with the Birds go some few Tarzans or Men Fridays whose origins are obscure, and who are being hopefully wished on to Mauritius etc. When this has been done, I agree we must be very tough."
The cover-up went to the very top. On November 5 and 8 1965, the Colonial Secretary, Anthony Greenwood, wrote two secret minutes to Prime Minister Harold Wilson, in which he described the problem of a "population of 1,000 inhabitants" living in the Chagos. He urged that the Queen quickly approve the "order-in-council detaching the islands" so that the new colony could be declared and "we should be able to present the UN with a fait accompli".
So when Wilson gave the green light to the order-in-council, he was aware he was overriding the legal and human rights of British citizens. He was stealing their country and ignoring the risks of "dumping unemployables in heavily over-populated Mauritius", as one honest Foreign Office official warned, not to mention the incalculable suffering this ensured.
Foreign Secretary Michael Stewart, a quiet, grey-haired, grandfatherly-looking man, took charge of the deceit. Writing secretly to Wilson on July 25 1968, he proposed that the government lie to the world that there was "no indigenous population", even though he had signed a memorandum circulating in the cabinet which admitted that "there was an indigenous population and the Foreign Office knew it".
On April 26 1969, Wilson's private secretary wrote to Stewart that the prime minister approved the "plan". Seven successive British governments have - to recall the memorable expression of a Foreign Office legal adviser in 1969 - maintained the fiction.
In his two autobiographies, Denis Healey, who was defence secretary in the Wilson government and responsible for turning Diego Garcia over to the Pentagon, makes not a single mention of the expulsion of the population. In 2004, I asked Healey for an interview. He replied, "I fear I have no memories of the Chagos archipelago. Sorry."
On May 6 1969, Healey's private secretary wrote to Downing Street, confirming that the Defence Secretary had read Stewart's plan and "agrees with its recommendations". Healey even queried the cost of expelling the population and sought an assurance that any "excess" above £10m would not be borne by his department.
The "policy of concealment" (as a Foreign Office file called it) ran almost to the end of the century - until the files at Kew were cracked open. Armed with this extraordinary evidence, Richard Gifford, the tireless lawyer representing the islanders, headed for the courts. In October 2000, Lizette Talate, Charlesia Alexis and others, led by a courageous islander, Olivier Bancoult, flew to London to give evidence in a high court action that challenged the legality of their dispossession.
The government had feared this, and, prior to the hearing, the Foreign Office mounted a disinformation campaign, led by Peter Hain. "The outer islands," Hain told the House of Commons, "have been uninhabited for 30 years, so any resettlement would present serious problems, both because of the practical feasibility and in relation to our treaty obligations."
A "treaty" implied an agreement scrutinised by parliament. There was no treaty: only a secret, criminal deal. On November 3 2000, in the high court, Lord Justice Laws and Mr Justice Gibbs stunned the government.
Citing the Magna Carta, which proscribed "Exile from the Realm" without due process, they unanimously squashed the 1965 ordinance used to deport the islanders as unlawful.
Lizette and Charlesia at last could go home, it seemed. But the Blair government had other ideas. That afternoon, the Foreign Office published a new immigration ordinance that banned the islanders from returning to Diego Garcia. Once again, "treaty obligations" with Washington were cited.
In 2003, the islanders were back in the high court, now seeking compensation. But this time they faced a judge who described the case as "unmeritorious" and "hopeless", and awarded the islanders not a penny - a decision "welcomed" by Bill Rammell, the Foreign Office minister responsible for the Chagos.
The following year, Rammell employed the same sleight of hand that the Wilson government had used to expel the islanders in the 1960s, when he sent an order-in-council to the Queen for her rubber-stamped approval. This overturned the Chagossians' high court victory of 2000 in its entirety and and banned the islanders from ever returning home. The order-in-council appeared on a list of innocuous royal decrees, between an amendment to the royal charter of the College of Optometrists and the appointment of Her Majesty's education inspectors for Scotland. No reason was given; a privy councillor simply read out the fate of thousands of Her Majesty's most vulnerable, abused and wronged subjects.
Richard Gifford and the islanders refused to accept this and were back in the high court last year. On May 11, two judges found unreservedly in their favour, describing the government's behaviour as illegal, repugnant and irrational. The government is considering an appeal, knowing that the Americans, having attacked Iraq and Afghanistan from Diego Garcia, are furious. The bombing of Iran is planned to take place from this British territory. Both governments apparently still believe they can "wear down" the islanders' resolve. They are mistaken, I can assure them.
I add my voice to John Pilger and assure the British and American governments that they are mistaken. Just before we conclude let me take you to the British Parliament's House of Common where we can have a flavour of the debate that took place on the 7th of July 2004 discussing an official report published by the government on the resettlement of the islanders. You can read the full text of the debate here. You will laugh as you never did before. It's a circus not a Parliament!
Mr. Tam Dalyell (Linlithgow) (Lab): These days, we are all too familiar with conducting foreign policy on the basis of false or misleading facts. The historical record now revealed by the islanders' legal struggle has after 30 years shown that a small and vulnerable population of British subjects can safely be written out of the history book on the pretext that they are not really a population at all. There is nothing new in deceiving the world while acting in breach of civilised standards of international and constitutional law ...
Mr. John Grogan (Selby) (Lab): I am pleased to be able to make a brief contribution to the debate. I am relatively new to this subject, but when I read the press reports a few weeks ago I could not believe that the Government, whom I so strongly support, are taking this action. I know the Minister to be a good man, and I cannot believe that his sleep is not a little troubled due to these problems.
The test of any Government, or any man or woman, is how they deal with injustices felt by powerless people. I urge the Minister to make a stand on this issue; if there are forces beyond his office, outside or within the Foreign Office, that are urging this course of action, I urge him to take a stand. I have looked at the press release—that is all we can go on as to the reasons why we are taking this action. I could see four: the risk of flooding; the precarious nature of life for any people who return; the effect on the delicate marine and terrestrial life caused by people who return; and the cost.
With regard to the risk of flooding, I have consulted one or two experts on the level of the land there, and a lot of it is higher than that in East Anglia. We know about flooding in my constituency of Selby, and if we accepted the argument on flooding that the Government are using, half of my constituency would be depopulated. Some outlying islands were inhabited in the past, and some were based on banks that were shifting in storms. There were tall copra trees on the islands and the inhabitants had worked out a mode of living—growing copra successfully, and in some cases raising huts on stilts. The argument does not seem overwhelming to me.
We have talked about the precarious nature of the life that would face any islanders who returned to the outer islands. The hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) was rather restrained and understated in quoting the American publicity about the islands. I shall detain the Chamber for a moment to give a little more flavour of what the US navy says about Diego Garcia in its message to its recruits. It says that Diego Garcia boasts
"unbelievable recreational facilities and exquisite natural beauty"
as well as "outstanding" living conditions. There is no mention of the threat of imminent demise from flooding. In fact, I understand that the US is seeking to extend the lease on its base, which would expire in 2016, so it is thinking long term. There is a windsurfers club, a yacht club, an annual Miss Diego Garcia competition, regular picnics to what the US describes as some of the best unspoiled beaches in the world, fishing, snorkelling and a beauty parlour. It does not sound that precarious to me.
As for the delicate marine and terrestrial life, the impact of the 1,500 US personnel, the British personnel, the 2,000 civilian contractors and the various military equipment must be at least as worrying, if it is the major concern, as the effect of some islanders returning to the outer islands.
Mr. Hopkins : It occurs to me that with all the wonderful facilities at Diego Garcia, the American forces must have first-class health provision. Would it not be a generous offer if the Americans provided health services for the returning islanders in return for occupying part of their islands?
Mr. Grogan : That would be a very generous gesture, shoulder to shoulder. Perhaps it could be the first gesture of President Kerry in November or December.
I would be interested to hear the Minister comment on whether any payment by the US Government has ever been made. Officially, the Foreign Office denies it, but time and again the suggestion in the literature is that the British Government at the time got a $14 million reduction in the cost of the Polaris nuclear missile system. I do not know whether that is true.
Clearly, with all the magnificent leisure, tourism and health facilities, it would not be beyond the wit of man or woman to develop a tourism strategy for the islands—perhaps the North Yorkshire tourist office could give some advice. I have a marginal seat, so perhaps there will be a job for me there. In any case, we do not seem to be dealing with a basket case of an economy, and I think the Minister knows that in his heart. It would be a great sadness for me and for other Members—present and not present—if a Labour Government did not bring justice to these islanders who have very little power. I appeal to the Minister to think again.
Mr. Salmond : Are there any weapons of mass destruction?
Tom Brake : It is not possible to see any weapons of mass destruction, but there are some very large hangars.
Mr. Rammell : The report says:
"Even in the short term, natural events such as periodic flooding from storms and seismic activity are likely to make life difficult for a resettled population."
"Human interference within the atolls, however well managed, is likely to exacerbate stress on the marine and terrestrial environment and will accelerate the effects of global warming. Thus resettlement is likely to become less feasible over time."
The report advised specifically, with respect to climate change, that
"the main issue facing a resettled population on the low-lying islands will be flooding events, which are likely to increase in periodicity and intensity and will not only threaten infrastructure, but also the freshwater aquifers and agricultural production. Severe events may even threaten life."
It also highlighted the implications for resettlement on such low-lying islands of the predicted increase in global sea levels as a result of climate change. That is where the facts, as my hon. Friend the Member for Selby (Mr. Grogan) said, need to be taken into account.
It is worth highlighting that the highest points on the islands are only about 2 metres above sea level and, in most areas, are just a couple of feet above sea level. We have to make a judgment, but not on whether we already have an existing, settled population who we need to protect and support. We are talking about islands where there is no settled population at the moment. That is the factor that we must take into account. In effect, therefore, as I said in my statement to the House on 15 June, anything other than short-term resettlement on a purely subsistence basis would be highly precarious and would involve expensive underwriting by the UK Government for an open-ended period, and probably permanently.
We made an assessment based upon comparative costings with other overseas territories with which we have significant experience, and we believe that the initial resettlement costs would be of the order of £5 million in start-up costs and £3 million to £5 million annually thereafter. The Department for International Development thinks that those estimates are overly optimistic and that the costs may well be higher. We are not talking about minimal costs.
Tom Brake : Will the Minister give way?
Mr. Rammell : I will not give way.
If one is prepared to sign a blank cheque for resettlement, one can repopulate, but we have a responsibility and significant contingent liabilities with the overseas territories and we must take accounts of costs.
Mr. Salmond : The sums that the Minister mentions are very small compared with the enormity of the issue and the blot on the moral conscience. Does the European convention on human rights apply to the British Indian Ocean Territory, and does the International Criminal Court have jurisdiction over Diego Garcia under the terms of the American lease?
Mr. Rammell : As I understand it, the ECHR does not apply, as there is no settled population. With regard to the hon. Gentleman's other question, I will respond later because I do not want to give a response that is not entirely accurate.
Due to the fact that settlement is not feasible, the Government decided after long and careful consideration—that was genuinely the case—to legislate to prevent it. Equally, however, legislation to restore full immigration control over the entire territory is also necessary, and I do not absolve ourselves from responsibility for this so as to ensure and maintain the availability and effective use of the territory for defence purposes for which it was constituted and set aside in accordance with the UK's treaty obligations entered into almost 40 years ago.
On that basis, two prerogative Orders in Council were made on 10 June restoring full immigration control over the islands of the British Indian Ocean Territory. Those controls extended to all persons, including members of the Chagossian community. This point has been made on several occasions, but a prerogative Order in Council is the normal way in which the UK Government legislate for an overseas territory. Indeed, legislation in that form on BIOT has been entered into in the past.
Excuse me your honours but all that discussion was rubbish. Now I fully understand how we lost Palestine and how Chagos people lost their homeland. It is so stupid to believe that £5 million per annum is too prohibitive of a cost to resettle all the islanders back in their homeland (I need to point out that the whole discussion was excluding Diego Garcia as it is not even negotiable to displease the American "Big Mamma"!)
If the British are truly sincere in atoning for their unforgivable sin, the least they should be doing now is starting an airlift or sealift to transfer all Chagossian scattering allover the world back to their homeland, including Diego Garcia, no matter how much it costs, whether that was millions of sterling pounds or a severe deterioration of the US-UK relations. This is the only way how we can still keep some hope the the British government ministers, members of Parliament, and all those electing them still have some sense of humanitarian equity and responsibility.
And always remember that the mother of all freedom and return odysseys, Palestine, is yet to be freed and that the Palestinian refugees are yet to return.
Useful links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diego_Garcia
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/05/12/wchag12.xml
Official site of the UK PJHQ Overseas Bases, Diego Garcia.
Diego Garcia Timeline posted at the Center for Cooperative Research
Photo and written library of the islands and their environment
Diego Garcia "Camp Justice", GlobalSecurity.org
US/UK BIOT defence agreements, 1966-1982, US Court filing
Where in the World Is Diego Garcia?, Infoplease.com
Simon Winchester on Diego Garcia, in Granta Magazine
Diego Garcia: Paradise Cleansed, by John Pilger
The Jewel in the Pentagon's Crown, by Gisle Tangenes, BitsofNews.com
Atoll Research Bulletin 149: Geography and Ecology of Diego Garcia Atoll
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